Last week an oil wrestling competition almost 650 years old continued in the city of Edirne, Turkey. Men from all over the country (and this year even a few Sumo wrestlers from Japan) come to this city west of Istanbul, cover themselves with olive oil and wrestle in a pavilion in front of thousands of people (of which I was 1 of about 5 women that I counted in the crowd). There's also a big fair with food, music, rugs, and tractors for sale. It's almost like a small state fair but no fried Snickers bars.
During the match we watched, about 50 men who were probably in the heavy weight division came out to the field and were introduced. Then they all walked and jumped around the field and chose their match ups on their own while the band beat drums and played horns.
Each match up had a judge standing by them. The match began and for most, it was very difficult to see who might be "winning." Most of the matches lasted about 20-30 minutes and then at some point the judge would raise one of the two men's arms as the winner. I had to come home and read the rules afterwards. Some of the ways a wrestler can win are: "Submission" where a fight is so long and difficult in the hot weather that one of the wrestlers simply signals his submission; also, one of the most decisive ways to win is if one of the wrestlers is able to gain the upper hand by reaching down the other wrestler's leather pants to gain leverage. It sounds very strange, I know. There are other ways to win, but none of them are necessarily ways we would think of winning in wrestling. No one gets knocked out or anything like that.
There are 13 categories each with a 1st, 2nd or 3rd place winner. the ultimate goal is to win 3 years in a row and win a gold champion belt.
I can say that I've been...
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